We imagine the TV landscape in 2050

If you thought there were interesting shows on right now, just wait until you find out what 2050 holds for the television landscape! Here's how we imagine fall TV playing out in roughly 30 years.

Grey's Anatomy

Now the longest-running medical drama in the history of television, Grey's Anatomy has taken the life-saving action to space! While Meredith Grey (Ellen Pompeo) is still doing the voiceover and occasionally showing up as a hologram, it's Zola Grey Shepherd who is running things at the new Grey Sloan Memorial Space Station. Zola is the Head of Neurosurgery and running the residency program, working to shape young minds. Get ready for ORs impacted by changes in gravity and medial transport shuttles getting stuck frighteningly close to a black hole! —Alamin Yohannes

America's Top Clone

At a future time when cloning is commonplace, the question on everyone's minds is: Why bother having a clone at all if they're not going to be perfect? Enter America's Top Clone, a new reality show where aging participants get to fiercely berate their own, younger clones for not making more of themselves. For people who always said they could've been a star athlete or a top-performing student if given the chance, seeing their own younger selves fail to accomplish those feats is a stinging wound — the kind we'll still love to watch on TV decades from now. The angry tone and displaced self-hatred might sound harsh, but this isn't America's Top Best Friend, after all! —Christian Holub

TV in 2050 — Illustration by Kyle Hilton for EW

Feud: Funny Girl

We have no doubt Ryan Murphy will still be creating material for his flagship franchises in 2050, including Feud, which thus far has covered the on-set drama of Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, and is next slated to dive into the world of Truman Capote. So, why not return to the real-life story of two of his own "greatest stars?" The drama that surrounded the long-awaited Funny Girl revival in spring 2022 far outpaced the pitch of the dramatic events onstage — from poor Beanie Feldstein's lackluster reviews as Fanny Brice to the extremely messy backstage machinations that led to Feldstein's early exit and her replacement by Glee star Lea Michele (who some devoted fans believed should've had the part from the start). Add all that to the fact that the two actresses, both stars of juggernaut Murphy shows, share an agent, and Murphy's got his own All About Eve brewing right in his own de facto acting company. Naturally, Feldstein and Michele MUST make cameos. Can you say, "Hello, Emmy!"? —Maureen Lee Lenker

The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills: Progeny Edition

Fabulousness runs in the family for these five divas — Stormi Jenner, Malti Marie Chopra Jonas, Eloise Christina Pratt Schwarzenegger, George Wiley Morelli, and Queen Cannon — who appear in the opening credits alongside holograms of their famous parents. Sample tagline: "Everybody's been trying to keep up with me since I was a zygote," says Stormi Jenner. "But I'm always two steps ahead." —Kristen Baldwin

RuPaul's Drag Race: Earth vs. The Universe

Not surprisingly, RuPaul's Drag Race can thrive in any condition, and in 2050, the franchise is bigger than ever. So naturally, it's adapted. But how do you get bigger than 100+ spin-offs all over the world? You... take on the universe! That's right, Drag Race is finally doing the unthinkable and challenging the universe's most fabulous aliens in RuPaul's Drag Race: Earth vs. The Universe. We don't always know how the aliens look so good, but we also don't ask questions. —Samantha Highfill

My So-Called Life

As the world of television gets continually criticized for being too bleak — we get it, the planet is dying! — one writer steps up to save the day by pitching a simple teen show. Set at Three Rivers High School, My So-Called Life follows Angela Chase (played by Zendaya and Tom Holland's first daughter) and her group of friends as they deal with adolescence. Angela can't take her eyes off of the school hottie, who has a thing for leaning against lockers. The twist? Not enough people remember the original for this to be touted as a reboot, and this time around, the show reaches millions, running for five seasons and finally getting the love the original deserved. —S.H.

Fauci

Millie Bobby Brown finally becomes an EGOT when she wins an Emmy for her lead role in this HBO biopic. Brown stars as Dr. Anthony Fauci, infectious disease expert and presidential advisor, who finds himself battling the twin forces of pandemic and misinformation during the outbreak of COVID-19. Middle-aged Stranger Things fans thrill to Brown's reunion with Gaten Matarazzo, whose performance as President Donald Trump receives a Golden Globe nomination. In 2050, successful limited series still get ill-conceived second seasons, and Brown sadly returns for 2052's Fauci: Origins, which flashes back to the doctor's high school basketball career. —Darren Franich

Twitter: The Documentary

A refrain comes up often online: That despite the supposed relevance of Twitter to pop culture, only a small percentage of Americans actually use the social media platform. But that ignores how much of the content on other platforms like Instagram and TikTok consist of Twitter screenshots!
In the same way, decades after Twitter's servers have finally been cast into the sea, future Americans will sit in front of their screens, rapt by the story of this legendary font of comedy, tragedy, and politics. At long last, we will learn the identity of mysterious posters like @dril! 30 years later, and talking heads can assess the legacy of kicking a President of the United States off his main platform. The multi-part documentary (a shoo-in for awards seasons) will also teach future viewers things they might never have known, like: What is a hashtag? Why did certain celebrities tweet constantly and others never at all? And why did we all care so much in the first place? —C.H.

Ultra Modern Family

Thirty years after the original series finale, twins Poppy and George Dunphy-Marshall are building their own chaotic clans in suburban LA — with the help of their parents, Haley and Dylan. George (played by Beckett Ferguson-Mikita, son of original Modern Family star Jesse Tyler Ferguson) and his girlfriend live with his parents in the apartment above Mitch and Cam's old house, while Poppy, her wife, and their twins, Stella and Lucy, live across the street. When Joe Pritchett (Jeremy Maguire, now 39) needs a place to crash after a divorce, he convinces his half-grand-niece Poppy to let him sleep in her pool house for a week — and then never leaves. —K.B.

Survivor: Planet Earth

In all its years on air, this reality show has put its contestants in some extraordinarily harsh conditions, pushing them to their emotional and physical brink. But Survivor: Planet Earth will bring them to their most hostile environment ever — an abandoned Planet Earth ravaged by climate change. The contestants will have to contend with blistering temperatures, sudden and devastating storms, and the threat of unpredictable rising sea levels. Not to mention the lack of safe drinking water and natural foods. Will they band together or destroy their alliances from the inside when they discover that half the contestants are, by design, direct descendants of oil barons, automobile manufacturers, fossil fuel CEOs, and fracking researchers? Tune in to find off who gets voted off the island. Er, planet. —M.L.L.

Doctor Who

We're still a few years away from the 100-year anniversary special in 2063, but in 2050, the iconic series still stands as the longest-running sci-fi show on television. The BBC will soon announce the identity of the 27th Doctor, and the upcoming season will feature a much-anticipated historical episode, following the Doctor and companions as they travel into the distant past of 2020. There, our two-hearted hero must try to stop the Daleks as they use Brexit chaos to try to take over the world. —Devan Coggan

It's a Trap!: The Admiral Ackbar Story

It's been nearly 75 years since the original Star Wars premiered, and in that time, the franchise has ballooned into a galaxy of prequels, sequels, and Disney+ spinoffs. Some have been more successful than others: A musical miniseries about the Max Rebo band's rise to fame swept the Emmys in 2037, while a gritty drama about "Adult Baby Yoda" flopped. At this point, every speaking character in the original trilogy has received their own Disney+ spinoff — except one. This fall, Disney+ will debut It's a Trap!: The Admiral Ackbar Story, following everyone's favorite cephalopod commander as he evolves from Mon Calamari recruit to future Rebel leader. Fans are particularly hyped, as rumors suggest this will be the first Star Wars spin-off to actually go somewhere other than Tatooine. —D.C.

Harry Potter and the Puff of Huffle

Daniel Radcliffe just finally gives up and plays the boy wizard again, in a film that dares to answer one of the Wizarding World's most enigmatic questions: Just what was going on at Hufflepuff while everything else was going on everywhere else? Puff of Huffle functions as a side-quel to the original saga, following some extremely dependable, generally bland Hufflepuff students as they attend classes, study hard, lose at Quidditch, and barely notice the annual fatalities and Voldemort incursions. The terrible magic of de-aging CGI allows Radcliffe to reprise his role as Harry, who frequently shows up at meals to discuss the crazy mysteries he's been solving. (Robert Pattinson excuses himself from the honor of a cameo.) —D.F.

Baby Dragons

Nearly 40 years after the premiere of Game of Thrones, the franchise has produced just about every show it can think of, including an award-winning origin story for the noble (and incredibly hot) Jorah Mormont. So, now what? Thrones has decided to get into children's programming with Baby Dragons! The new show is like a mix of Baby Looney Tunes and Gargoyles as it follows a young Caraxes, Syrax, and others as they grow up in Westeros and solve harmless mysteries. (Spoiler alert: Watching them learn how to breathe fire is the cutest half hour of television you've ever seen.) —S.H.

Marvel Phase 35

The Avengers have defeated Thanos, Kang, and all manner of intergalactic threats. Now, they're facing off against their most devious foe yet: time. Many of the OG heroes have retired, died, or been revealed to be Skrulls, and the new Avengers lineup features some familiar faces, including an all-grown-up Morgan Stark and Tommy and Billy Maximoff. The new leader of the Avengers? Paul Rudd's Ant-Man, who somehow reconstructed the Time Stone and has used it to remain completely un-aged through the decades. —D.C.

Make sure to check out EW's Fall TV Preview cover story — as well as all of our 2022 Fall TV Preview content, releasing over 22 days through Sept. 29.

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